Week 13: Happy to finally announce...

That we have another Bloomfield baby on the way!!!!

I'm currently 12 weeks and 6 days pregnant. I'm due on December 3rd.

Yesterday I had an ultrasound and the baby looks great. Strong little heart beat and I got to see a nice side profile. Nic and Ben stayed home because Ben was napping and I had to go for bloodwork afterwards anyway; fortunately the technician took the above image for me to bring home.

Right now I'm feeling pretty good. I had some awful morning sickness earlier on, and I was really tired, but I'm bouncing back now. Just in time for Nic to go away on business for a week. (What a looooong week that's going to be!)

Here's a copy of the photo I sent to Grandpa and Nana Beaton to announce the pregnancy.
Doesn't my boy look big??

Ben also wore this t-shirt to announce to Granny and Granddad during a visit.

I've been secretly blogging all along, and so now that I'm revealing my pregnancy I'll allow those posts to go live today, so if you're interested, start looking back in March (I found I was pregnant on Easter Sunday which was early and in March this year).

Congrats to Andi, Vinny, and big brother Cooper!

And welcome to the world, baby Molly!

Andi gave birth to her and Vinny's second child, Molly, this morning via c-section weighing in at 7 lbs 13oz. I haven't met Molly yet, but I'll visit this evening and report back with photos. I'm thrilled to say that Molly was born healthy (despite some complications during pregnancy) and is in the NIC unit just for observation.

**Photo Update**

Week 13: A little preggo update

I'm definitely past my morning/all-day sickness. I get the occassional wave of nausea, but it's usually curbed with a little food.

I'm sleeping much better. I wake maybe once per night. And the allergy medication/nasal spray has helped tremendously with my stuffiness. We also found the cats a new home (we sure miss the girls), but it will take a few months before the house stops being an allergy zone.

I've put on more weight this time around. With Ben I'd gained 1 lb by week 13, but this time around I've put on almost 5 lbs. (but with the extra weight I'd gained over Christmas I'm actually 9-10 lbs over my prepreg - and postpreg - weight with Ben *sigh*). Well, I suppose now is not the time to obsess over my weight gain. The fact that I seem to be having a healthy pregnancy so far is most important.

My IPS u/s is booked for this Monday, after which I will publish all my pregnancy posts. And hopefully I'll leave with a little photo that I can post too. :)

A few Ben funnies.

Last night Nic was reading Ben his bedtime stories (Ben calls stories 'dillas'), and after each story Ben would announce 'Ahhh. Good dilla."

The other morning when I went to get Ben from his room I asked him if he'd had any dreams. He said 'yeah', so I asked what about, and he said 'boobies!' (He's a little obsessed with 'boobies' lately.)

A couple of weeks ago Nic was playing with Ben in his playhouse. Ben was inside the house, so Nic rang the doorbell, then Ben answered the door and Nic pretended to be one of those Direct Energy guys... Ben immediately shouted 'BYE-BYE!!' and slammed the door in his face.

What a funny kid!

Ben reacted to raw egg yesterday

I was making a lemon merengue pie yesterday and since Ben had been doing so well with cooked egg I figured the next logical step would be seeing if he was okay with raw egg -- he's not. I let him lick the beaters with uncooked merengue on them first, wiped his face off, and didn't see any hives. So figuring he was fine with it I let him have the spoon with merengue, and then the hives formed. Poor thing. He developed about five hives around his mouth and a few on his trunk.



I left a message for Ben's allergist yesterday and heard back today: he says it's okay to continue with cooked egg, just to avoid raw egg. I do think I'll err on the side of caution though and just stick with egg product (like baked goods, pastas, etc.) as opposed to egg dishes (like scrambled eggs, quiche, etc.) to avoid the possibility of undercooked egg.

Still, a step forward in Ben's allergies.

Oh, and the results of Ben's tree nut testing were good. They tested him for pistachio, brazil nut, almond, hazel nut, walnut, cashew, and sesame seed: all were negative. We'll still avoid them because tree nuts are generally packaged in facilities that also package peanuts, but at least we don't have to worry about casual contact, i.e., if another kid eats them and touches him or passing a large open container of almonds in the grocery store.

Another step forward in potty training!

Ben TOLD ME he needed to go pee! He's never told me he needs to go pee. We're either at home where there's a potty accessible for Ben to help himself to or Nic and I take him to the potty when we figure he's due.

HUGE step forward! YAY for my big boy!!!

Nothing like *that* to remind me I'm a mother on Mother's Day

I gotta say, my day started out great. I stayed in bed, watched Corrie St, Nic and Ben picked up McD's breakfast (all of this is like every Sunday... I love my Sundays!). I got up, had a shower (also like every Sunday... ha!), came downstairs to a nice bouquet of flowers, card, and a gift (a new book). Wonderful! We all hung out a bit, I made a small solo grocery run (a real treat when you're used to carting along a bored, fidgety, cranky 2.5 yr old boy), came home, we had lunch, then Nic brought Ben up for his nap.

When Nic came downstairs after putting Ben down he asked if I'd mind if he went out to hit a bucket of balls at the driving range. Not at all. So off he goes.

About a half hour later I decide to pop the monitor on and see if Ben's fallen asleep. I hear chattering, a bit of banging around, decide I'll go up and see what's happening. Good thing. Nic had forgotten to put Ben in a diaper (he put him to bed in his underwear!!!) AND Ben had peed AND pooped in his bed. I didn't realise the poop until I'd stripped his underwear off, Ben stepped in a load of poop that had fallen out, and proceeded to walk on his carpet leaving two poopy footprints on it. (Ugh!) So I carried him off to the bathroom, cleaned him up, cleaned the bathroom up, got him into a diaper, then back to his room, cleaned the carpet, stripped the bed, remade the bed, got him settled into bed (after a couple of trips up to remove distracting toys from his possession he's finally falen asleep), and I'm now on laundry load one of two.

Good times!

And here I thought I was in for a relaxing afternoon of Toblerone munching on my sofa while poking around on my laptop.

And on that note, I'm wishing all my family and friend mommies a very happy Mother's Day!

Week 10: Tanya and Yves are super-slueths!

At least when it comes to my pregnancies...! They guessed I was pregnant with Ben when I was only about 8 weeks along, and this time they figured it out too. Just last night. No hiding anything from these guys! Fortunately they're good secret-keepers too. :)

Three accident-free days in underwear!

We stuck close to home this past weekend, but yesterday we went out: in the AM we went to the park, and in the PM we went to the mall. Twice. (Passport photo fiasco - don't ask.) And Ben did great! He successfully used the porta-potty at the park in the morning, and we tried the bathroom at the mall, but he didn't have to go.

So YAY BEN!!!! There's no looking back now! :D

Ben's pronunciation is improving.

We've been practicing a little bit lately and he's now saying 'ba-NA-na' instead of 'bay-low' (ha-ha! no idea where he got 'bay-low' from). And we're working on 'Granny', which tends to sound more like 'gah-ee', but is getting closer to 'GAN-ee' (the 'r' will come later :).

Our GP is also impressed with Ben's vocab and pronunciation too. He's definitely seeing an improvement, especially since Ben said 'bye-bye Dr. Yee!' the other day as we left the office. Everyone in the waiting room thought it was the cutest thing (and, if I may say so, it was!).

Week 10: Finally catching a break.

For the past couple of weeks I've been taking a prescription nasal spray and it's been a godsend. I've been breathing fine and, as a result, sleeping! What a novel concept.

My moring sickness seems to be easing up, too. Thankfully. I wasn't sure I'd survive this pregnancy if it kept up. Especially hearing many stories of women being sick throughout the entire 9 months. Ugh. They deserve a freakin' medal.

Nic and I have decided to go ahead with the integrated prenatal screening (IPS) since I'm almost 35 (next month!). It consists of an ultrasound and bloodtest at 11 - 13 weeks, followed by another bloodtest at 18 weeks, to detect markers for Down's syndrome, trisomy 18, neural tube defects (like spina bifida).

And lastly, I've had to pack away two pairs of my regular jeans. There's just no getting them done up. And I put on a sweater this morning that made me look like Humpty Dumpty. Not flattering at. all. No doubt I'll be showing a little sooner this time around.